Author: Fiona Broome

The road to Gilson Road Cemetery winds through residential and rural sections of southern Nashua, New Hampshire. It seemed familiar and straightforward that night, since Alan, Jane and I had been there earlier in the day.

We parked our cars off the road, at the north end of the cemetery. I was amazed at how dark it was without streetlights on that moonless night. It was about a half mile to the nearest house, and few cars travel that road at night.

(This was before the subdivision, Tanglewood Estates, was built across the street from Gilson Road Cemetery.)

It was about 9:30 when we got out of our cars. Two cars, six people.

There was a gate at the southern end of Gilson Road Cemetery, but a low stone wall sat nearer to our cars. So, we climbed over the wall and entered the cemetery that way.

We were barely over the wall when I heard Alan inhale sharply. He paused for a few moments, and then dashed into the cemetery as if chasing a runaway puppy. I shook my head over this, and slid the lens cover off one of my two cameras.

I began taking photos at the north end of the cemetery. Nancy disappeared into the murky darkness, running her hands over the headstones as she walked. A few minutes later, I saw her camera flash at the southern end of the cemetery. I remember smiling, because I knew Nancy had found something that interested her.

My son, James, was with Alice and Jane. Alice seemed nervous. Jane was not quite as boisterous as she’d been earlier in the day.

Perhaps it was because every hole and fallen branch in the cemetery seemed to find her as she stumbled in the dark.

“Payback,” I sighed to myself, remembering her earlier jokes. Nobody else was stumbling the way that Jane was.

Jane led the others towards Alan, in the center of the cemetery.

Once my eyes became accustomed to the darkness, I could see the outlines of my companions, and sometimes their pale faces would catch what little light there was.

I continued to take photos, knowing that ghost photography is often a matter of numbers: If you take 100 photos in a good, old cemetery, you’ll probably have at least one or two “anomaly” photos in the group. It almost doesn’t matter what you photograph. If you take enough pictures, some of them will have anomalies.

We were at Gilson Road Cemetery for about 20 minutes when James approached me quietly. He said, “I think we should be heading home soon. Alan looks like he’s going to be sick.”

I walked over to Alan. He didn’t look right. In the darkness, it was impossible to tell whether he was pale or rosy-cheeked, but his expression looked pained.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he lied. “Well, sort of…” His expression made it clear that he wasn’t ready to talk about it.

Next: No, he wasn’t fine. Something was definitely going on.

Alan looked a little dazed, but I didn’t plan to be at the cemetery much longer. I left him and continued taking photos.

SPARKLES

Then the sparkles started. I’d heard from other ghost photographers that, when the flash goes off, haunted cemeteries often manifest something like an array of twinkling lights. I never expected to see it.

At least half the time that my flash went off, I saw an amazing display of sparkling lights in the woods at the back of the cemetery. At first, I thought it was wet leaves reflecting the bright light of the flash. Then I realized that we hadn’t had rain in several days. Besides, these weren’t quite like reflections anyway.

I took over three rolls of film that night, and when I saw the sparkles, it was like fireworks. Not the initial bright flash, but after the fireworks have exploded, and the remaining bits sparkle as they fall towards earth. That’s what it was like, looking through my viewfinder as I took each photo.

A few times, I didn’t look through the viewfinder, but just held the camera up and clicked. I still saw dozens of twinkling and sparkling lights in the woods around us. Some were about the size of a baseball, others were the size of a 1950’s Christmas tree bulb. The colors varied. They were white, bluish white, and pink-white. They faded slowly after each flash, as they fell towards earth. It was gorgeous, silent, and reliable: At least half the time I took a picture, I’d see the sparkles.

These were at least 20 – 30 feet away from us, in the woods in back of the cemetery. The lights weren’t bugs, pollen or dust in the line of the flash.

Jane saw the sparkles too, but not as often as I did. I think Alice did. Nancy and James did not.

THE HAUNTING BECOMES MORE OBVIOUS

Alan seemed to be trudging in circles. He’d walk deep into the cemetery, to the stone wall at the east side. Then it looked as if he was muttering to himself, as he walked purposefully back to the car. Finally, he’d return to the cemetery, and then head deep into the cemetery again. And then he’d repeat this.

I was a little concerned about him, but my goal was to take as many photos as possible. Besides, I was enchanted by the sparkling lights.

James indicated one headstone that he had a “good feeling” about, so I took three photos of it, one right after the other. Later it turned out that he was right. Every one of those photos has a great anomaly in it.

A few minutes later… I don’t know what it was. It was like a train had just passed me at an underground rail station, but the air hadn’t moved. I took a couple of photos, and I remember seeing something different and saying, “Whoa! What was that?” But I don’t recall what I experienced.

Then Alan returned from another one of his trips to the back of the cemetery. I took his photo as he walked towards me, just in case I’d capture something in that photo, too.

When the photos were developed, I was very glad that I’d done this.

THICK, HEAVY ENERGY FIELDS AT THE BACK OF THE CEMETERY

“You’re going to come with me and tell me if I’m going crazy or what,” Alan demanded. It was the first clear thing he’d said all night, and it wasn’t a request, it was an order.

Something was really wrong.

We walked to the back of the cemetery, where a stone wall separated the graveyard from the woods behind it. I remember seeing Nancy to my right, still taking pictures.

About ten feet from the stone wall, I had to slow down. It was as if I was wading through molasses, or at least the shallow end of a swimming pool. To just above my knees, it was if there was a thick energy field dragging at me.

Alan also slowed down. Later, I found out that he’d experienced the same thing.

(This is helpful during investigations. If people do not share what they’re experiencing until afterwards, it reduces inadvertent “cues” being passed along, triggering an overactive imagination.)

When we reached the back wall, we paused.

Next, we witness a massacre from the past

GILSON ROAD CEMETERY, NASHUA, NH – PART FOUR

(Continued from Gilson Road Cemetery, Part 3)

At that back wall of Gilson Road Cemetery, I was overwhelmed with visual images.

Here’s what I mean when I say that I “see” things like this: When I’m reading a wonderful book, and often when I’m writing, it’s as if there’s a movie in my head.

I never forget that what’s in my head is not what I’m seeing with my physical eyes. But the images I see intuitively, are nearly as clear as if I’d seen them happening right in front of me.

That’s how I “see” things in a spiritual context, too.

So, as I stood at that stone wall, I “saw” carnage. I saw Native people with hatchets or something. There were only about six or seven men close to me, but I knew more were nearby. I didn’t want to look around to see the full panorama.

I also knew there were fallen bodies and a lot of blood on the ground. I didn’t want to look at that either, so I didn’t. I didn’t get the idea that those were settlers on the ground, though. It seemed as if the battle took place when there were settlers in America, but in this vision, the Native Americans weren’t fighting the Colonists, from what little I saw.

Really, after years of dealing with this kind of “second sight,” I generally monitor my field of vision. If it’s too upsetting, I shut it out.

I did that a lot, at Gilson Road Cemetery.

ALAN EXPERIENCED THE BATTLE, TOO

Alan and I stood there for several minutes. I know that I mentioned the killing, the Native people, and that there were people dying as I watched. Most of the violence was already over by that time. Alan nodded, and added things that he perceived. It was a horrific scene we were witnessing, and it was far more vivid than any movie, or news footage.

Nancy approached us, and asked what we were “seeing.” She didn’t experience any of this herself, but she seemed driven to understand what we were feeling. She watched us closely, and asked several questions about what we perceived.

LEAVING THE BATTLE SCENE

After a few more minutes, we left the massacre and walked back towards the car. The dragging energy slowly released me. Once again, about ten feet from the wall, everything seemed fine. The surroundings looked lighter, sounds were clearer, and the air was fresher.

I turned to look back, and take a few photos of the woods. My camera, usually reliable, jammed. Unlike Halloween night, it wasn’t the flash that failed, but my camera didn’t want to advance. I pushed the rewind button and waited until I could remove the roll of film, which I tossed into my purse.

Alan stayed next to me, and explained that he could hear people talking or whispering nearby. He said that it’s like someone in the next room talking, where you can almost understand what they’re saying, but not quite. He said that he kept turning his head, trying to catch the words, but he couldn’t quite understand them. He said it was annoying.

I didn’t hear anything. I was still overwhelmed by the visual imagery I’d experienced. We walked back to the cars, and I paused to see what the others were doing.

OTHERS’ REACTIONS

By now, James, Jane, and Alice were at our cars.

Jane muttered something about there being people – not ghosts, but real people – in the woods across the street. She could hear their voices, she said. I asked if they were making a lot of noise and she said no.

She seemed convinced that they were going to bother us, and she seemed very agitated. She insisted that we had to leave immediately.

I remember thinking how it was all her imagination. If any living people were out there, they’d either have flashlights or they’d be making a tremendous amount of noise, tripping over fallen branches in the dark. I didn’t hear or see anything. I took a few photos of that area, just in case.

Alice was in her mother’s car and determined to stay there. I’m still not certain what she experienced at Gilson Road Cemetery, but she was clearly shaken. Illuminated by only the dim interior light in her car, I could see that Alice looked unnaturally pale and her eyes were too shiny.

Not everyone deals well with profound hauntings. That’s sensible. Sometimes I think that ghost hunters are foolhardy.

Or, perhaps Alice had a premonition of something that would happen, and soon.

James looked like he was trying to make sense of it, but he is a very level-headed kid… and generally a skeptic. He’s been around intensely psychic experiences, and he knows that nothing terrible happens in most cases. In a way, I think he enjoyed being the one that the others could rely on.

I glanced back at my own car. Alan was leaning on the trunk, as if he’d just run the Marathon. He slowly stood up and said something about having had enough for one night. I opened my car door, planning to leave before anyone really fell apart, and I saw a flash of light.

Nancy was still happily in the cemetery, taking pictures.

I said, “Just a few more photos,” and left to join her.

Next:  A few more photos, and then the aftermath

GILSON ROAD CEMETERY, NASHUA, NH – PART FIVE OF FIVE

I think all of us were pretty rattled by what happened. Maybe we should have admitted how scared we were.

We each responded in our own way.

Most everyone headed for their cars. Some locked themselves inside.

I climbed back over the cemetery wall and tossed another roll of film into my camera. I didn’t want Nancy to feel as if we were waiting for her, so I started taking more pictures.

About a dozen photos later, Nancy was also ready to leave. She and Alice headed north in their car. Alan, Jane, James and I decided to go back to my house.

All of the way home, I kept hearing Jane’s shaky voice. She promised that she’d never joke in a cemetery again. She was very apologetic, and repeated that she hadn’t expected anything like this.

Alan slowly emerged from the apparent haze he’d been in during his first lengthy and intense encounter with the paranormal. He said over and over again that it was like a movie, but better… and worse.

James – most comfortable insisting that ghosts aren’t real – seemed to think the whole thing was pretty cool and didn’t say much.

I remember that I kept babbling, hoping to put it in a context for Alan so he’d understand the experience better.

(Also, I was still annoyed with Jane’s daytime joking in the cemetery, because I know that a flippant attitude or a vocal skeptic in the group can dash all hopes of getting good anomalies on film.)

Once we got home, Alan and Jane stayed to talk for awhile. About an hour later, Alice called from her mother’s cell phone.

Alice and Nancy had gone to Vale End (Wilton, NH), another, more famous haunted cemetery, and Alice had been chased by something dark and terrifying.

She was okay, but rattled. We agreed to talk about it later in the week.

The evening was finally over. I went to bed, but didn’t sleep well. Something seemed… wrong. Was it a premonition? I couldn’t decide, and tried to dismiss that thought.

But still… something felt wrong.

PHOTOGRAPHS AND ANOMALIES

Three days later, my film was back from the developer: Over a third of the photos had anomalies in them.

During the time when I felt an intense energy rushing past me, like a train (but the air didn’t move), I had – apparently – taken two photos with startling purple energy in them.

One of these photos – now famous – is below.  Click on it to see it larger, with an article about the picture.

The roll of film that had jammed (not the one with the purple photo, above) had a perfectly reasonable explanation: Somehow, sand had gotten into my camera. A few images on that roll were scarred where the sand had dragged along the film. I’ll be more careful in the future.

None of Nancy’s photos had anomalies in them. She wasn’t surprised. She said that people who experience paranormal phenomena probably pick up things on film that others don’t.

She had studied my earlier photos and the negatives from them, and had said that they were exactly what they appeared to be: Anomalies. Things that “couldn’t be,” as she put it. But they were not developing or printing mistakes, double-exposures, or anything like that.

Nancy had hoped to capture similar anomalies herself, but she seemed content to have a few great photos from an eerie cemetery. I’ll use at least one of her photos in my upcoming book on ghost hunting.

Since then, I’ve tried scanning my Gilson Road photos from November 5th, to show the anomalies. One photo has six anomalies in it, including a black orb. (Black orbs are very rare.) However, they’re very dim, even with 800 ASA film.

I’ve abandoned my scanning efforts with most of those photos. Even looking at the originals, it’s like “Where’s Waldo?” trying to find the orbs. They’re easy to spot when you know where to look, but otherwise, you’d never notice them in most of the photos.

But the purple-streaked photos are my trophies from that evening, along with the chilling memories of what we witnessed.

Alan and I went back to the cemetery one sunny afternoon the following week, so I could compare my anomalies with the surroundings. I was looking for things to explain the odd lights and orbs in my photos.

We climbed over several stone walls, and studied every corner of the cemetery. The anomalies in my photos remain unexplained.

Alan and I left after about an hour at the cemetery. I could feel the energy building up again. Although it was many hours before dusk, I could feel the “people” gathering again. The massacre probably happens again most nights, whether the living are there to witness it or not.

Gilson Road Cemetery is the most intensely haunted place I have ever visited. Whatever lives and dies there each night, is still a very powerful force.

The ridiculous thing is, soon after our visit, a developer began building Tanglewood, an upscale community across the street from Gilson Road Cemetery. Most people consider me a fearless ghost hunter, almost foolhardy at times. However, I’m not sure that I’d be willing to live near Gilson Road Cemetery.

NANCY’S DEATH, SOON AFTER

One personal note about this story: My friend Nancy died of an apparent heart attack in the middle of November 1999, about a week after our first formal investigation at Gilson Road Cemetery.

A reader asked if there was any link between Nancy’s death and the Gilson visit. At the time, I didn’t think so, and I still don’t consider Gilson “dangerous.”

However, Nancy also went to Vale End Cemetery that same night.

I didn’t write about Vale End Cemetery for a couple of years. Then I did, and several networks and local TV stations swarmed at Vale End, claiming that it’s a “world’s scariest” place. In my opinion, it’s not especially “scary”, but there are some risks if you go there.

Since removing my reports from the website did not discourage people from going to Vale End Cemetery, I’ve put them back online. (There are four articles about Vale End Cemetery among our New Hampshire pages.) I talk about Nancy’s death in this article: Possible demons at Vale End Cemetery.

Right now, I prefer to think that Nancy’s intense interest in ghost photography was due to a premonition she may have had, about her own time drawing short.

Also, I’ve talked with many people who’ve visited Gilson Road Cemetery. Not one ghost hunter’s story, from recent or distant past, has tragedy linked to it.

In my opinion, the only dangers at Gilson Road Cemetery are encounters with boisterous party-goers (at keggers behind the cemetery), the usual risks if you visit a cemetery after its closed, and the occasional turned ankle since Gilson has many snake holes and depressions that indicate unmarked graves.

For additional reports about Gilson Road Cemetery, see our next page, Gilson Road Cemetery – Nov 1999 follow-up visits.

26 Nov 99 (2)
Who: Six of us When: About 8:30 p.m., for about a half hour

Purpose: To use disposable cameras (one for each person) and random photos. Goal was to estimate how many “ghost photos” a beginner can expect, using the cheapest disposable camera available, with almost no how-to instructions, and on a random night…which turned out to be too damp for reliable results.

Results: Many ghost photographs. Averaged three anomaly photos per roll of 27 pictures. Orbs were discounted due to damp conditions. Anomalies included unexplained lights, particularly a blue line in two of Alan’s photos that corresponded to similar lines in my photos and one other person’s pictures, as well. Other anomalies included some odd mists.

The best photos of the night were a dense mist rising from near two graves, and a baffling, swirling mist at another grave.

Note: With what I’ve learned from my photo research since then, the photo might show my own breath. I’d say that’s a 50/50 chance, since I haven’t been able to fully duplicate it, but came close. Maybe.

ADDITIONAL VISITS

28 Nov 99

Who: Two of us When: About 7 p.m., for 10-15 minutes

Purpose: To use spray bottle of water to try to duplicate the damp conditions of the 26th, and compare with “dry” photos taken at same time on the 28th.

Results: Active entity present. There was some other energy present, like something there for dinner. It wanted us to leave, so we did. Telepathic communication was almost verbal, “Get out. Get out NOW.”

On 6 Dec, some of the photos were printed. The two I took when I was getting that telepathic message, have a purple smear across them, similar to the photo I use on the opening page of this website. (It’s not a light leak; I was using a different camera, and the light doesn’t extend outside the frame.)

30 Nov 99

Who: Three of us When: About 8:45 p.m., for 10 minutes

Purpose: To check the energy levels, and take a few photos.

Results: Numerous active anomalies. Strong sulphur smell in area, probably from swamp. Something grazed the edge of my hat, sounding like a higher-pitched bumblebee, and much faster. I could feel the heat from it as it passed. Left no mark on my polarfleece hat. No other sound before, during, or after it passed.

Alan’s brand new flashlight dimmed, flickered, and then went out as if the batteries had died. It was fine immediately before and after the cemetery visit, even when we tried to make it fail again.

No significant energy, even at the back wall of the cemetery. Quite flat, in fact. Like almost every other sort-of-haunted cemetery. Nothing remarkable.

My cameras recorded some odd light effects, but I’m 90% certain it was a glitch at the camera lab. It affected four photos in a row, almost identically.

2 Dec 99 (1)

Who: Four of us When: Noon

Purpose: Verify headstones, check locations of anomalies to start compiling data relative to graves and cemetery “hot spots.”

Results: The vicinity of certain graves remains the most active for non-orb anomalies. However, photos taken near the wall itself were not productive.

2 Dec 99 (2)

Who: Three (?) ghost hunters When: After 6 p.m.

Purpose: Felt drawn to the cemetery

Results: Many anomalies. Rampant spectral activity. Whispered warning from entity. Found an unexplained warm spot over a depression/grave near the Lawrences’. Police asked group to leave, and waited while they did.

We’ve agreed to stay away from this cemetery at night, for awhile at least.

4 Dec 99

We didn’t visit Gilson again, but met a young woman who’d been there with friends about two months ago. After her nighttime visit to Gilson, she’d told several mutual friends the story she told me: She saw the black shape of a man in a hood rushing towards her and her friends, and then he vanished. The girls left the cemetery, screaming in terror. This matches with a story from about two weeks ago, when two other ghost hunters encountered an entity described as a black shape like a man in a hooded garment.

It could also be the nighttime appearance of the man that I saw during the day on November 25th. I was thinking along Colonial lines, so I described him as wearing a brown-black capote (hooded garment).

During November and December 1999, a couple of us returned to Gilson Road Cemetery.  We went back several times after our first formal investigation at Gilson. The following are notes from some of those 1999 follow-up visits.

8 Nov 99

Who: Two of us

When: Early afternoon

Purpose: To check for daytime phenomena, also for things that may have caused anomalies in first rolls of film that came back.

The photo at left has a small, reddish orb above a grave, and at the far right side of the photo there are a couple of “eyes” just above the wall. I enlarged them in the right photo. Results: Didn’t find anything to explain the “eyes.” I expected to find mushrooms or something similar. Energy seemed to be building at left corner of cemetery. Hiked to back wall past the cemetery, took photos. No anomalies.

9 Nov 99

Who: Two of us

When: Early afternoon

Purpose: To check for gypsy moth nest, or anything else in trees that accounted for “sparkles,” some of which showed up in photos.

Results: The trees were nearly bare, with nothing to explain the reflections/sparkles of the 5th. Energy building, not so much as on the 8th, but still coming from the area past the back left corner of the cemetery.

25 Nov 99

Who: Two of us

When: Late morning

Purpose: Just to check it out

Results: Saw a ghostly figure that vanished. Sensed two or three entities (male forms) in wooded area past back left corner of the cemetery. Saw, in our time, an adult-sized figure in a dark capote, probably brown-black suede. Figure was about 30 feet past back wall of cemetery, had to be near swamp. He was there for a few seconds, walking through the woods. He passed in back of a narrow tree — narrower than his body — but didn’t emerge out the other side.  I couldn’t believe that he vanished. I walked around, looking for him, still thinking he was a hiker or something. Nobody was there.

Otherwise, very low spectral energy. Average for an apparently haunted cemetery in bright sunlight.

26 Nov 99 (1)

Who: Two of us at first, then a third person

When: Dusk

Purpose: To take some photos

Results: Encountered what seemed like ghosts. Misty night produced questionable photos, but some anomalies other than orbs. Saw steady phosphorescent flickering around one headstone at top of cemetery. Flashes of light, bands of blue-white color, in woods behind cemetery. Most appeared to be about ten feet behind wall, determined by which trees lights were behind and which they were in front of.

Energy building, especially at back left corner of cemetery. Bands of spectral energy along left wall, and apparently across the street. Spirits (as “people”) arriving one or two at a time, from far right, behind cemetery. Flurry of violence perceived, then totally quiet again.

Our late 1999 research reports continue at part two, Gilson Road Cemetery – 1999 follow-up visits